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hi everybody,
just uploaded the latest progress of a site I'm working on - for a friend's music promotional company.
It would be great if someone could spare me a minute to test out my navigation and give me some feedback on it... ;)
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/tiscali_folder/eurogigs/
It's still work in progress, the texts still need to go in there and additional buttons put in - but the main navigation is set up and done - and needs to be tested ;)
Thanks ;)
Happy flashin' ;)
Prisca
Hey eyedea,
Great lookin site! Loved the intro. Very creative. The only thing that bothers me about the nav is the text that you have for buttons for example: in the about ,"who we are, tour dates, artist lists". They dont look like they're seperate. maybe have them look like seperate buttons the whole thing looks like one button. I hope that makes sense. Only my opinion. Great looking site! Good luck with it!
Peece,
Mel
nice intro... :)
I'd agree with melmann about those buttons. In fact, the whole menu box actually suffers from that, and mouse-wise, feels like just one big button, with no individual rollovers, cursor changes, or other feedback (if there were event sounds, i missed them on my system with the audio off).
The nav transitions inside the menu box were extremely slow and jerky on my system (Pentium II), and took a very long time to finish.
The menu box was very slow to respond to dragging, and actually disappears behind the edges of your main swf box if you drag to the edges (i guess there's a masking background layer at a higher level than the menu). :eek:
hope tht helps :)
melmann and verto - thanks for taking the time to check the site :) :) :) I appreciate it!! :) :) :)
About the menu - you're right it is only one big button for each of the sections, I was wondering whether that does make sense or not... - I put it together like this mainly to give people the chance to read what each section does before going into it, just trying to be as clear as possible really. I'll take another closer look at it and maybe seperate them, just not sure how exactly I can access the right bit of text in the submenus...I'm not exactly an AS genius unfortunately...
About the transitions... shame they're coming out so jerky... I noticed that, tried a few things but can't figure out how to make it any smoother....
About the draggable menu - that shouldn't be slow in responding to the dragging..?!?! - One of friends said that making it draggable seems pointless anyway - what do you think?
Verto, thanks for pointing the problem out - I know it disapppears... I've tried to find a solution for that but I've got no idea how to set it up so that it will stay on top... I'm not loading into levels, I'm targeting MovieClips as I don't know any other way how to control the positioning of the loaded swfs precisely...
Thanks again, guys!!!! :) :) :) :)
Happy flashin', ;) Prisca
A very nice site, but isn't it a bit too dark?
I like the effects in the intro, but the site itselfs is a little bit empty
please check my sites too:
http://board.flashkit.com/board/show...hreadid=331107
"About the menu - you're right it is only one big button for each of the sections, I was wondering whether that does make sense or not... "
i don't think it makes sense myself -- if you make too many things on your pages act like buttons, and then also have things that look like buttons, but don't match the actual hit states very closely at all ... you're really going to do a good job confusing ppl -- and not just new users, because subconsciously it confuses everyone.
in the same vein, I'd resize the hit state for the main menu button at top of the page, where it spreads out into the gold boxes below it.
the other way to go though would be to take away the boxes and make things less buttony looking -- in your case, i think the first way would be easier :)
"About the transitions... shame they're coming out so jerky... I noticed that, tried a few things but can't figure out how to make it any smoother.... "
it may well be the frame rate you're using ... that's one thing you could try.
It looks like you might be scripting the transitions -- in that case you could change the increment size for the variable that pumps the _x position.
Now that I realize the bottom area isn't really necessary to keep navigating, it doesn't seem the transitions need to finish that quickly. ;) :)
About the draggable menu - that shouldn't be slow in responding to the dragging..?!?! - One of friends said that making it draggable seems pointless anyway - what do you think?
response time could be at least partially related to my low-end system (Pentium II). Probably what's slowing it down at least a bit is the transparency along with the number of overlaid graphics. I think draggable menus can be both useful and fun, but they need to work well in both cases -- it depends on what kind of systems you're targeting and how you want it to feel.
I just tried the dragging again, and it didn't seem as bad as before. Another factor affecting the response (especially on this system) is how many other windows and resources are used at the same time. Having several Flash sites open, for example, can change the responsiveness tremendously. :(
"Verto, thanks for pointing the problem out - I know it disapppears... I've tried to find a solution for that but I've got no idea how to set it up so that it will stay on top... I'm not loading into levels, I'm targeting MovieClips as I don't know any other way how to control the positioning of the loaded swfs precisely..."
I think levels might still apply if your clip's on a lower level than the background around it. Check where that black border is coming from -- is it inside its own movie clip?
:) :)
[Edited by verto on 06-23-2002 at 07:34 PM]
THANKS VERTO !!!!!!!!!! :) :) :) THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!
It's great to get an objective view :) I tend to get too focused on little details that sometimes odd bits gets left behind!!! Thanks for taking the time, I really appreciate it :) :)
About the main meu button at the top: I'm always pretty generous on the hit state area and I did go eyind the boxes but I've redone it, covering even more, hope it'll work better now... THANKS
I noticed that the other buttons as well are responding slow, the hit states are as large as I could make them without overlapping.... - do you think it might have something to do with Flash 5 vs FlashMX..?!?? - I'm using Flash MX but i publish the movies as Flash 5 swfs....- as the target audience isn't necessarily always up to date... - The new Flash MX now finally runs as smooth on my MAC as on any PC (used to be very frustrating!!) - but I don't want any people who have the normal Flash PlugIn for their browser to be cut out, just because I'm using MX, if you know what I mean...
About the transitions - nope, no AS... wish I had the brain for that one... - The only bit of scripting is the mini preloader those submenus have. And only the 'about us' section has the slow opening up of the logo - just really like the idea visually - like an image for an open company, sort of... "inside eurogigs", so to speak...
About that black border - what black border???? That's weird - I don't see any on mine..... there shouldn't be any :( I'll double check that....
Talking of different monitors.... could I ask another question? - Is the background colour the same as the wndow colour? A friend of mine said that it looks like a greenish sort of colout for the window, whereas the flash background is grey... - I used the same value (#272727) for both..?!???!?
Anyway, sorry to go on so long...
THANKS AGAIN FOR ALL YOUR HELP :) :) :) YOU'RE A STAR!!
;) Prisca
improvements
can't remember for sure, but if you also took the 'main menu' out of its box, i think that helps lots
am glad you published in 5, cause that's what this system's got, and it's awkward to use one of the one's w/ the v6 player on it ... you're definitely right not to limit your audience w/out good reason, IMO . not sure though which buttons are responding slow? let me know...
that black border?
"Talking of different monitors.... could I ask another question? - Is the background colour the same as the wndow colour? A friend of mine said that it looks like a greenish sort of colout for the window, whereas the flash background is grey... - I used the same value (#272727) for both..?!???!? "
uhhhmmm .... yes, that was actually the 'black' border i was referring to. I guess being stuck up against the #272727 background makes it look black, as it's much darker
than the 272727 -- i actually tried matching it, and got close at #152700...
part of what makes it weird is that it doesn't show up until you try scaling the swf inside the html window. for example, if you load the .swf w/out the html, you can't see it. but as you stretch it out IN the html file, it scales along with it, but as a dark band in between the #272727 of the html bgd and the #272727 of the .swf.
my best guess
my best guess at this point is that it's some extra layer near the bottom of your .swf file with this color, just wide enough to stick out beyond the other stuff by a pixel or two, so that it doesn't get noticed until it's scaled out, if you catch what i mean ... probably wrong about that, but it's my best guess right now ;):);)
"And only the 'about us' section has the slow opening up of the logo - just really like the idea visually - like an image for an open company, sort of... "inside eurogigs", so to speak... "
oops, maybe that was the jerky transition i remembered... the worst one of the lot, tho, like you, i like the idea of it. :)
glad you like the improvements :) - yeah, the menu lost the frame, while I was looking at it that really bothered me...
What a pain about the colour/border thing... it is getting late now and I'll have to call it a night, got to get up for work in the morning, but I'll look into that one again... stuff like that is sooo annoying... :(
I am planning to set up an alternative html site so I would probably open the flash file in its own chromless pop up - do think that might solve it?
Anyway, got to go.... THANKS and thanks again, verto!!! :) :) :x
Sweet dreams ;) Prisca
"do think that might solve it?"
Haven't got to do much with the chromeless windows -- wish i knew more about them, but ... hell, don't even have flash on this system... anyway, good luck with it, and i'd be interested to know what it was.
;)L:)::)